Dell Latitude X200

The Dell Latitude X200 has much better bones. It starts with a 2.9-pound, 11- by 9-inch system containing a 12.1-inch XGA display, a keyboard 97 percent of the standard size (with 18.5-mm dot pitch) and integrated wireless. To that you can add a 2.5-pound expansion base that holds an optical drive and a floppy disk drive.

The X200 we tested came with a 733-MHz Mobile PIII-M, though Dell plans on including a slightly faster processor by the time the X200 ships in May. Its performance was much faster than that of the Toshiba and Compaq ultraportables. And overall, the X200 is not much slower than 1-GHz-plus notebooks weighing over 6 pounds.

Dell uses the Intel 830MG chip set, which integrates graphics and shares system memory with the CPU. This is the most cost-effective of the three 830 chip sets and works only with a unified (shared) memory architecture (UMA). Using what Intel calls Dynamic Video Memory technology, 8MB to 48MB of memory can be shared on PCs equipped with 256MB of system RAM. The 830MG is faster than previous chip sets (such as the Intel 815) but not as speedy as the performance-oriented 830M, which can use either separate or shared memory, or the 830MP, which allows for a separate graphics chip set.

Most users will find the 18.5-mm pitch of the keys adequate for typing, and the 12.1-inch screen is large enough to let you comfortably view a 1,024-by-768 image. The system abounds with legacy and forward-looking ports: parallel, serial, VGA, PS/2, USB, modem, Ethernet, and IEEE 1394 (now using a full-size connector rather than the miniplug found on earlier models). Dell offers external CD-ROM and DVD/CD-RW drives as options, or you can opt for the media slice (MediaBase in Dell parlance) to add an expansion bay and optical drive.

Dell's optional long-life, 58-watt-hour battery ($129) replaces rather than supplementing the main 20-watt-hour battery, extending the system depth by almost 2 inches. But this gets the job done: Battery life on BatteryMark jumped from 2:27 with the standard battery to a unplugged-all-day 6:41 with the replacement battery.

Dell complements the hardware with corporate support services. These include performing enterprise-class management (via OpenManage Client), collecting asset and configuration info (OMC Instrumentation), monitoring system status (OpenManage IT Assistant), and stabilizing hardware and software for at least 6 to 12 months (to permit phased rollouts in big companies). Dell has also consistently had the highest grade on our annual Service and Reliability Survey.

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